


Put Yourself Back Together

by Duck_Life



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Brainwashing, Identity Issues, M/M, Space Politics, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-02
Updated: 2016-03-02
Packaged: 2018-05-24 09:57:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6149842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duck_Life/pseuds/Duck_Life
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finn's taken prisoner by the First Order. Poe's helpless.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Put Yourself Back Together

They get him.

Poe does everything he can, swooping and shooting and shouting out orders to his squadron, and it’s not enough. As soon as he hears Finn’s panicked voice over the comms he dives for the ground, and it’s not enough. He lands in time to see them drag Finn’s unconscious body onto Phasma’s shuttle, and he feels sick, and he shoots and he can’t do a damn thing. It doesn’t make a difference.

General Organa gives a speech, and she uses words like “hero” and “tragedy” and “memory,” and it’s like Finn is already dead.

Poe knows it’s worse. Poe shuts his eyes and tries to breathe and he knows, he knows it’s worse.

“You know he didn’t even have a name when I met him?” he tells Jess later that week, trying to work on his X-Wing despite the fact that his hands can’t stop shaking. “Bastards didn’t even give him a name.” He tries to wipe a grease spot off of his fingers with a rag; he scrubs his hands again and again and they never come clean. “And now they’ve got him again. They’ve got him again.”

“Finn’s strong,” Jess says.

And he knows. Poe knows that Finn is strong, and that’s really the worst part, because he knows the First Order won’t stop until they break him, until they work him into their tin soldier again. And Poe knows that Finn’s strong, and he knows that Finn’s going to have to go through so goddamn much before they break him.

Poe doesn’t think anyone’s even told Rey yet. He thinks about sending her a transmission and trying to explain, but he doesn’t even know what he would say.

For two weeks Poe waits for nothing, he lies awake in bed at night and he thinks about nothing but Finn and every day he asks the General when they’re going to go rescue Finn and she dodges his questions. For two weeks. Two weeks, and then during breakfast in the mess one morning, the monitors hanging from the walls flare to life.

Poe’s heart stutters in his chest, because there’s Finn, bloody and bags under his eyes but alive, his face gracing every monitor in the mess. There’s commotion in the hall before everyone starts to listen.

Onscreen, Finn stares glassily while an unseen voice, cold and female, asks him, “Do you know why you are here?”

Poe realizes belatedly that he’s been holding his breath, and when Finn speaks his chest feels too tight. “Because I was _captured_ ,” he says, “Captain.” He throws venom into that last word, and he’s so brave, and Poe’s never loved him so much.

A hand whips across the screen and hits Finn, hard, leaving a string of blood trailing out of his mouth. ”Because you were _rescued_ ,” she tells him, “from the horrors of the Resistance.”

“No,” he says, breathing hard. “That’s not true.” She hits him again.

Poe can’t stop himself from wondering how long they’ve been doing this to Finn, lying to him and hurting him and waiting for him to fall in line. Around the mess hall, everyone’s eyes are fixed on the screen and no one’s moving. The Captain lowers her voice and says softly, “What is your name?”

And Finn, Finn blinks and he sets his jaw and he tells her, “My name is Finn.” And he screams.

It’s a solid two minutes after the transmission cuts off that Poe realizes they ran an electric shock through Finn.

The General is a wreck.

“I need someone working out how they got to our monitors _right now_ ,” she barks out, a whirlwind storming through the war room. “If this base isn’t secure, we need to leave _yesterday_. Ackbar—”

“Twelve,” Ackbar responds immediately, knowing the question she’s going to ask. “That stream was shown on twelve different planets.” The General swears and marches off, almost walking right into Poe.

“General,” he says, barely able to stand still. “I have to go. I have to go and get him.”

“Poe,” she says, and she almost reaches out and puts a hand on his shoulder. Almost. “I’m sorry, I can’t let you do that.”

“ _Why not?_ ”

“Look, if I thought there were a chance you would come back, I’d be all for it,” she says, and she sounds so old. “Just give us time, Poe. _Please_. Don’t go rushing off half-cocked. They’ve decided to broadcast his… his torture, to brag I suppose, and we can _use_ that. We will find him. I promise.”

As the days tick by, each of them agonizing, Poe falls into the rhythm of things. He lurches out of nightmares every morning and he goes to eat his breakfast and he watches them lie to Finn and shock him and smack him and hurt him. Every single day. Only Poe’s imagination can suggest what they might be doing to Finn during all the time that he’s _not_ on air.

They’re doing it to prove a point to the rest of that galaxy, of that Poe’s sure. The First Order wants everyone to know what they can do, the steel that their Stormtroopers are made of and how they got that way. They want everyone to know the force of the First Order, the ruthlessness, and they want everyone to know that even a great Resistance hero can fall. No one is safe. The First Order makes sure everyone knows that when they broadcast every morning.

Every time, the Captain ends the session by asking Finn his name. They want him to repent. They want him to call himself FN-2187, and feel the numbers click into place in his voice like they belong there.

He never does. Every day when the Captain asks him his name, he tells her, “I’m Finn. My name is Finn.” He doesn’t always say it with his head held high and his gaze defiant, but he always says it. And then they punish him for it.

Poe watches every morning with mixed pride and horror, because Jess was right, because Finn is _so, so_ strong, and the First Order is cutting it out of him bit by bit. Finn cries and Finn screams but he always tells them his name, _Finn. My name is Finn. I’m Finn_.

A month goes by, and then another, and it’s torture for Poe. He hates to use that word because God, look at what Finn’s surviving, but he can’t lie to himself. That’s what it feels like. It feels like he’s being ripped apart. Every time he sees Finn show up onscreen it breaks him a little bit more.

The General gathers information and plans and plans and plans, and everyone’s pretty sure that she’s not sleeping.

One morning, after the Captain finishes with the standard procedure of ask-hurt-hit, she asks him his name, as usual. Finn opens his mouth to tell her but she stops him; there’s a sound of someone being dragged in.

The camera pivots to show everyone the kid, a trooper cadet, can’t be more than fifteen. He looks terrified. Poe feels sick. The Captain puts her gun to the boy’s temple and turns back to Finn. “This is EK-2377,” she says. Finn swallows drily. “Now, I want you to consider your answer very carefully this time. Because if you answer incorrectly, you won’t be the one getting hurt. _What is your name_?”

Finn watches EK-2377, who’s thin and shaking, and Poe knows what Finn’s going to do. He’s too good, too kind, and he isn’t going to let anyone die because of him. They boxed him into a corner.

 _It’s okay, Finn_ , Poe thinks, wishing he could reach him, wishing there were a way for Finn to hear him. _It’s okay. You can say it. No one’s gonna blame you._

Finn swallows again, and then he speaks. “I don’t have a name,” he says slowly, his hands clenched in his restraints. “My designation is FN—”

“His name is Finn,” the kid shouts, and he’s trembling with fear but his voice is steady. “He has a name and it’s Finn. And _my_ name is Erik—” The Captain shoots him point blank, Finn yells, and the screen goes black.

That’s when Poe realizes that Finn’s become bigger than a person. He’s a movement.

Across the Resistance base, other planets aligned with them, the remains of the Republic, posters start going up with Finn’s face plastered all over them, the words _His name is Finn_ blazoned on the bottom. Jessika Pava has a huge one over her door. There are reports of Stormtroopers revolting, turning on their superiors and disobeying orders. A few escape, either to Outer Rim planets or all the way to the Resistance, naming themselves. A woman who named herself Bridgette confers with the General every day about tactics and the state of affairs in the First Order. One man tracks down Poe and tells him that he knows that Finn got his name from Poe, and that he wanted Poe to name him as well.

Finn, of course, gets punished even more severely. The Captain deprives him of his senses and waits for him to feel utterly isolated, then offers him reprieve in the form of conditioning. She drowns him, electrocutes him. Poe’s pretty sure they’re drugging him, because Finn’s eyes look glazed too often and he seems disoriented as the broadcasts go on.

And then one day the broadcasts stop altogether.

The General calls Poe to her office.

“You’re leaving tonight,” she tells him with no preamble. Bridgette and the other trooper defect— Poe named him Kass— stand by her side. “Bridgette and Kass know how the infiltrate the Star Destroyer where Finn is. Take them and whoever you need,” the General tells him. “ _Bring Finn home_.”

Poe takes no time in gathering his troops, most of them— particularly Jess— already chomping at the bit, ready to leap. The plan is to launch a minor attack on one wing of the Star Destroyer, a massive warship called the _Palpatine_ , while Poe, Kass, and Bridgette board, find Finn, and get out.

By the time they set foot on board the _Palpatine_ , Kass is shaking. “Easy,” Poe whispers, blaster in hand. “We’re all gettin’ out of this, okay?”

“I used to work here,” Bridgette says, looking around with some trepidation. “Before.” _Before I got out. Before I had a name._ Poe nods and leads them down the corridor, Kass and Bridgette whispering directions to him. No one knows exactly where they might be keeping Finn, but the three of them have cobbled together a pretty good idea.

When they find the cell, Bridgette figures out how to open it and Poe quickly and quietly knocks out the one Stormtrooper standing guard. Bridgette and Kass keep a lookout while Poe steps into the room.

It’s been three months, one week, three days, six hours, and twenty-seven minutes since he last saw Finn. Just seeing him, beaten and shackled but _alive_ and _here_ , it almost brings Poe to tears. “Hey buddy,” he whispers, making his way toward the center of the room. Finn doesn’t look up. “It’s me. I’m here. You’re gonna be okay.” Finn says nothing, and Poe feels the familiar burn of panic in his gut. “Say something, buddy.”

And then Finn mumbles, dark and low and muffled. Poe strains but he still can’t make it out. “What?”

Finn says it again, looking obstinately at the gleaming floor. “ _You’re not real_.”

It’s like Poe is a balloon and all the air is leaking out in one long whine, leaving him empty, leaving him with nothing. “’Course I’m real,” he says, trying to keep his voice even. He heads for Finn and starts working on the restraints. Finn jerks and tries to look away from him but there’s not much he can do about the small laser Poe’s using to slice through the cuffs. “I’m busting you out.”

“Stop it,” Finn says, his voice wavering and broken, and Poe’s trying like hell not to think about what they must’ve been doing to Finn when the cameras were off to make him so sure that Poe is nothing but a delusion, a trick. “Stop talking like him.”

“Listen to me,” Poe says, stepping around to face Finn head on. Finn tries looking away no matter how hard Poe tries to meet his eyes. “I’m Poe. It’s really, really me, and I’m so sorry, Finn, I’m so sorry I didn’t come sooner but I’m here now. And we have to leave _right now_ or someone’s going to find us and I… Finn, I _need_ you to _believe_ me so—”

“No, no,” Finn says, turning and glaring at him. His eyes are bloodshot and he’s riddled with scrapes and scars and bruises and he still looks like he might be kind of drugged but even with all that, there’s a familiar fierceness in his eyes. “You can’t trick me. You can’t. _I know_. Poe’s not stupid enough to risk coming here.”

“Of course I am!” Poe says, desperate. “I am stupid enough! I’m very stupid!”

“ _You’re not Poe_.”

“Yes,” he says, and they’ll be discovered at any second and Finn is staring at him with such distrust in his eyes that it feels like Poe’s breaking into a million tiny pieces. “Yes, I am Poe. Poe is my name. Just like yours is Finn, and that poor kid’s name was Erik.” Finn’s eyes snap up at that— maybe he doesn’t believe that anyone in the First Order would acknowledge the kid. Or maybe it just makes him more suspicious. “Listen,” Poe says, pleads. “Once upon a time you saved me from the First Order. You remember that?” Finn says nothing. “Let me save you back, alright? _Please_. For me.”

Finn looks up at him, big tired eyes and he’s spent that last three months being ripped apart, dug into again and again and again, and he’s been so strong the whole time. He’s been so strong. He can’t do it anymore.

“Okay,” he says, he surrenders, and Poe helps him to his feet and leads him out of the room. He can tell Finn doesn’t really believe him— he just can’t put up a fight anymore. Poe walks him through the corridors, hating how weak Finn looks, hating that he can’t walk any faster, hating the First Order. They’re almost to the shuttle, Kass and Bridgette up ahead of them, when that cold familiar voice calls out.

“FN-2187,” she says, and they turn to see Captain Phasma standing at the end of the corridor in all her chrome horror.

Poe doesn’t think; he just shoots and shouts. “His name is Finn.” Phasma’s armor keeps her from getting seriously wounded but she staggers back. It’s enough. They’re home free.

The squadron calls off the attack when they see Poe’s shuttle, and then they’re all zipping back to the Resistance. Poe can hear his squad members whooping and hollering over the comms. It’s not often they get to rescue anyone, let alone Finn, who’s become something like a legend.

Poe pilots the shuttle with Bridgette in the seat beside him while Kass sits with Finn, who keeps rocking back and forth, his eyes darting wildly. Poe thinks back to Captain Phasma and wishes he’d shot to kill.

They get far enough away from the _Palpatine_ that Poe can breathe again, and he suddenly feels a warm hand on his shoulder. Finn. He’s watching the stars speed by outside. “Oh,” Finn says, all the tension draining out of him. “It _is_ you.”

After Finn heals, after the parties and congratulations and ceremonies, the General calls him to her office. It’s been almost a week since he was freed from the First Order.

She doesn’t look like herself. The General’s usually pinned-up hair spills loose around her shoulders and she looks like she hasn’t slept. “Finn,” she says, “would you like a drink?”

He fidgets with the hem of his jacket— a new one from Poe, he lost the first one after being captured. “I, um, I don’t think so,” he says.

“Do you mind if I have a drink?” Finn shakes his head, and the General pours herself an extremely liberal amount of something Corellian in a bottle. She throws some of it back, studies him. “How are you?”

“I’m fine,” Finn says. His wrists are still too thin and he looks like a mess, covered in injuries and marks, but at least the glassy look is gone from his eyes. At least he’s _here_.

“Sure you are,” she says, not buying it. He tries to remember her history, what he’s heard about Vader and the Grand Moff capturing her and torturing her for information, blowing up her planet before her eyes. “I owe you an apology, Finn.”

“What? No—”

“I do,” she says, stopping him. “The First Order was trying to turn you into an example. But we were no better. We turned you into a symbol.”

“I… I helped a lot of people,” Finn says, because sometimes that’s all that can get him to sleep.

“And we didn’t help you,” she sighs. “Until it was almost too late. Finn, you’re more than a number, but you’re more than just a name, too.” She reaches out and up, puts a hand on his shoulder. “You’re a good man,” she tells him, and he thinks back to Poe telling him the same thing a lifetime ago. “I’m so sorry, Finn.”

That night Finn finds himself outside Poe’s door, staring at his own face on a poster plastered up across the wall. _His name is Finn_. He swallows and hits the buzzer beside Poe’s quarters. “Hey,” he says when Poe comes to the door, his voice too low and raspy. “Can I sleep in here tonight?”

“Of course,” Poe says, and he takes Finn’s arm and leads him back to the bed.

They start out on opposite sides of the bed, fingertips just barely brushing each other, but soon enough Finn’s moving closer and clinging to him and Poe’s running one hand up and down Finn’s arm and telling him over and over all the little things he missed, all the little things he never thought he’d see again. “You’re the bravest man I’ve ever known,” Poe says, “and the strongest. And you have a good heart and a huge sweet tooth and a great laugh and I missed you so goddamn much, Finn.” He holds him and he tells him, and Finn is Finn but he’s more than that, too.

“You know,” he mumbles, “I really don’t like the picture they used for those posters.” Poe laughs, sounding a little broken and a little bit put back together, and he holds Finn a little tighter.


End file.
